Outed CIA agent criticises White House officials

Friday 16 March 2007 14.23 EDT
First published on Friday 16 March 2007 14.23 EDT

Former CIA officer Valerie Plame told a congressional committee today that senior officials in the White House and state department had "carelessly and recklessly abused" her identity.

Ms Plame described her outing as a CIA agent four years ago - which triggered a federal investigation - as a "travesty" which was done for "purely political reasons".

She believes she was unmasked as a retaliation against her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, who was critical of the Bush administration's pre-war intelligence on Iraq.

Last week a top White House aide, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, was convicted of perjury over lies he told FBI agents investigating the leak, which led to Ms Plame losing her job.

Answering questions publicly for the first time since her name was revealed in a newspaper column in July 2003, she said: "My name and identity were carelessly and recklessly abused by senior officials in the White House and state department.

"I could no longer perform the work for which I had been highly trained."

Ms Plame said she always knew her identity could be discovered by foreign governments but said she was surprised to be identified by her own government.

"It was a terrible irony that administration officials were the ones who destroyed my cover," she told the House oversight and government reform committee.

She also expressed concern at the increasing politicisation of the work of the intelligence services, saying she would rather resign than be influenced to disclose inaccurate information.

Democrats are eager make political capital out of the scandal but Ms Plame's lawyer, Theodore Wells, has said it is unlikely the hearing will offer any new information about the leak.

Ms Plame's testimony was not likely to include any behind-the-scenes details about the CIA or the White House and nobody from the White House or the state department, where the leak originated, was scheduled to testify.

Nobody has been charged with leaking her identity.

Committee chairman Henry Waxman, a Democrat, said that even though prosecutors brought no charges for the leak, questions remained about whether policies were followed.

"It's not our job to determine criminal culpability, but it is out job to determine what went wrong and insist on accountability," Mr Waxman said as he opened the hearings.

Mr Wilson has written a book on the case and Ms Plame's book is expected out soon. Both are suing the vice-president, Dick Cheney, and other government officials for violating their constitutional rights.